


Evigheden

by alchemystique



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-12
Updated: 2015-01-12
Packaged: 2018-03-07 05:27:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3162941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alchemystique/pseuds/alchemystique
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s not him. Not really. She knows it, deep in her bones, even as his words ring true to her admittedly wonky-under-emotional distress lie detector. </p><p>There’s something wrong with him, and no matter how much it hurts she’s <i>going to fix it</i>. </p>
            </blockquote>





	Evigheden

**Author's Note:**

> Title is the Danish for “Eternity” which, if you have any knowledge of the original Snow Queen tale, is just one more reason why I’m a terrible, awful person who should probably stay in her corner like I’m told. This has been Jossed completely but I still like it.

It’s not him. Not really. She knows it, deep in her bones, even as his words ring true to her admittedly wonky-under-emotional distress lie detector. 

There’s something wrong with him, and no matter how much it hurts she’s _going to fix it_. 

It’s a surprise, to her, how overwhelmingly certain she is of this, after so long living just waiting for the other shoe to drop, but she _is_ certain, this time. 

Killian’s heart is hers, it has been for a long time, and if there is one thing she knows for sure its that Killian? He doesn’t let go of feelings like that. He isn’t the type of man who can let go of that - he’s passionate and his love is all-encompassing, and _nothing_ can change that.

He’s never been one to live by halves, never the devil-may-care persona he likes to put up, that isn’t him.

It hurts though. God it hurts.  
  
To see him slide his eyes over her with little more than mild disdain, no thought for her past, no care for her own pain - it hurts, and she’s not sure when she started just assuming he’s always be there for her.

She didn’t realize until now just how much she’s come to rely on him - to know he’ll be at her side, be there to comfort and to guide and to _push_ her. Push her to be better, push her to be more open and to _trust_ and believe in herself, push her to let her herself feel all the things she’s been running from for so long.

She wants to tell him he was right, in the end - he’d won her heart without tricks or deceit, he’d _won_ it and now he doesn’t even care. She doesn’t tell him, though - she lets his eyes slide right past her as if she’s little more than an inconvenience, lets his words cut like knives on an already jagged wound, and she searches, and she waits.

He waited for her for so long, she knows that now, understands with terrible clarity all that he’s given up in pursuit of her heart. 

She can wait, too. She _will_. For however long it takes, she will find a way to bring him out of this, and when she does - well.

That’s when the fun truly begins.

———

"Bad luck, Swan," he says when she tells him he’s been cursed, a wave of his arms as he shrugs at her the only movement he makes, and he tilts his head like he’s trying to suss her out - god, she misses his horribly genuine stares and the way he always knew the right words to say - she craves it, deep in her bones, the want digging at her skin until it aches and burns. "If only there was someone out there who loved me."

The way he says it - bored, monotone, completely uncaring - it wrecks her, etching deep grooves into her ribcage. The effect of it startles her, the breath knocked right out of her as she stares at him, because this man has spent all his considerable years searching for this very thing and now he _doesn’t even care_.

It’s a lie - all of it, no matter how true it may seem to him now, and she swears she will fix it. Fix him, and be there for him, even when he uses her long held fears against her, even when he can’t remember the most important things they share.

That’s the worst of it, really - he can remember as well as her every moment they’ve shared, can still read her like an open book, but the sentiment is missing, the care, the devotion, the intrigue and the kindred hearts, it’s all _missing_ and now she’s just another piece of loot he’s no longer interested in.

It should break her. It should - this is the very thing she’s always been most afraid of, not being enough - but she holds onto the thought of him - the way he’d said her name when she couldn’t remember his face, the way he’d pulled her close as she shivered against him, the trembling breath he’d taken as she kissed him senseless in the middle of the street.

He is not a man of fleeting affection, and even as he shoots her a lazy grin and turns away from her without a care for her own shuttered expression, she swears she will fight for him, as he’d once fought for her.

———

David shoots her a concerned look as she barges into the station, snowflakes in her hair and a mission on her mind. She knows well enough by now that banking on a True Love’s Kiss is useless - it won’t work, not with something missing between them.

"Emma," he says, and for all that he’s quietly, half-heartedly disapproved of Killian he knows what the man means to her.

Maybe better than she does herself. 

"There has to be _something_ , Dad.”

"There is. There always is. We just… have to find it."

That’s the thing, isn’t it? It’s always a search, for them. 

He reaches for her, hand catching her arm and Emma lets him pull her into his arms, doesn’t fight it when he cradles her head and tucks her against his shoulder. She wants to cry, to rail against whatever unseen forces have ripped Killian from her - he’s _right here_ but she’s never felt so far away from him.

"We’ll find a way, Emma."

"I know," she mutters against her fathers shoulder. "I know."

———

Worthless, Gold had said, rotten to the core, and for a moment Emma had agreed, and she hates herself for it, hates herself down to her marrow, hates that she could have even a flicker of doubt in her mind. He’s wrong. Killian has become a good man - an honorable one, a _hero_ , and even if he wasn’t all those things, he’s been all of them for her. 

So when she sees Gold raise his arms, sees him readying to destroy the man he’s hated for centuries, sees Killian turn to face him just as a blast of magic careens his way - it’s not even a question in her mind to jump in front of the spell.

Whatever Gold had spelled, it hurts like a _bitch_ , and she tumbles to the ground, blinking back tears as her shoulder knocks hard against the pavement - she almost misses the flash of white light that bursts out around her. 

Almost, but not quite.

She guesses that the spell hadn’t been entirely effective on her, seeing as she’s still _alive_ , but her whole body is throbbing with pain and she’s pretty sure she’s got some broken ribs from the force of it knocking her back, and she groans as her head falls to the ground below her. 

“ _Emma_!”

The leather boots slide into her line of vision as she’s grimacing, and her eyes fight not to droop closed. She wins the battle, for the moment, as Killian bends before her, and suddenly he is _there_ \- his brow furrowed and his eyes concerned and _oh god_ , is she dying right in front of him?

"Emma, sweetheart. What did you do?" There’s a frantic edge to his voice as his hand digs into her hair, cradling her head, and it clicks, finally, when he pulls her up, his gaze fast and firm and he is _here_.

"Killian?"

"It’s me," he says, and that’s really all she needs - she can feel whatever dredges of her own magic have been keeping her awake are beginning to fade, but she manages to curl a hand against his cheek as he stares at her like the world is crumbling around him, like this pain she’s feeling is his very own. "Emma - please Emma, I don’t - I’m so sorry. You can’t close your eyes. You can’t…"

It’s him. She doesn’t know how, she doesn’t know _why_ , all she knows is that Killian, her Killian, he’s here, and she’s sure as hell not going to bring him back just to have him watch her die.

Her fingers fist in the collar of his jacket and she yanks him to her with more force than she’d realized she still had - the burst of light behind her eyelids when their lips meet is definitely more than just a burst of pain, and that is twice in as many minutes that that has happened, what in the _hell_ -

Her eyes flit open to catch his own, and then the world goes black around her.

———

She drifts in and out of consciousness the next few days, hearing snippets of conversations and random phrases that don’t make much sense to her. The one constant is the fingers curled against her own - even in the haze she can make out the shape and weight of Killian’s rings, and despite the confusion it keeps her sane throughout the whole ordeal.

When she finally opens her eyes, the muddled confusion and the mindless drifting falling away, it’s to find Killian watching her.

"You’re barking mad," he tells her, with no preamble, and she grins at him, their fingers curling tighter as he stares at her like she hung the moon - like he’s always looked at her. 

"You’re welcome," she tells him, and his expression takes on the sort of exasperation she should have expected. 

"What on earth were you thinking, love?"

"I was thinking I wasn’t going to let you die as some hollow non-person who forgot how much he loved me."

She can’t be entirely sure, but she thinks his ears go red. “Ah, so it was all about you, then, was it?”

"Absolutely. What, did you think I liked you, or something?"

"The thought had crossed my mind."

"Silly pirate." She’s obviously still recovering from whatever the spell - and her own magic, and Regina’s - has done to her, she feels loopy and lightheaded and maybe a little bit in love. She’ll never tell. 

Something flickers across his face, some memory coming to the forefront of his mind as they smile like idiots at each other, and his expression fades into worry. “Emma. After everything I said to you - after what I did, how could you -?”

"Killian. I’m pretty sure I’m on the magical equivalent of a morphine drip right now, so don’t take me at my word, but I’m pretty sure I just True Loved you out of an unbreakable curse, so… you know. That’s how I could."

The furrow in his brow only deepens, and he lets out a heavy sigh, unfurling their clasped hands in order to reach up and brush a lock of hair back from her face. She leans into the touch, eyes fluttering, and this. This is everything. This is Killian, not the Captain Hook shell she’s been trailing after the last few weeks - every look and touch is hers and hers alone and she _wants_.

"Stop fretting and kiss me, idiot," she tells him, and the bright twinkle of his eyes as he laughs makes her whole body flush with warm joy. 

He happily obliges.


End file.
